


L'origine Nascosta

by dannihowell (iguessicantry)



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Domestic Violence, Dysfunctional Family, M/M, Neglect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-30
Updated: 2016-07-30
Packaged: 2018-07-27 16:55:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7626538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iguessicantry/pseuds/dannihowell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>follow me on tumblr<br/><a href="https://danni-howell.tumblr.com/">dannihowell</a></p></blockquote>





	L'origine Nascosta

**—-**

In the backroom, there was a piano. It was black and chipped. Dust collected on every inch, grasped every string.

On the Sunday afternoon we came to pack, my little boy wondered into the backroom. “Mummy,” he called. “You didn’t say they had a piano.”

I stood in the doorway and watched as he ran his fingers over the wood, much like I had. The windows faced west so the sunset’s bright rays filtered in through the curtains. My little boy said, “Can you play a song?”

“No,” I told him. “That was my daddy’s piano. I can’t play it.”

“Because he wouldn’t like it?”

I nodded. Daddy didn’t like anyone touching his piano. Well, Papa didn’t like _anyone_ touching that piano. Not after everything.

The room remained quiet for a little while until my boy got bored, as he often does, and he scurried off, out of my arms and into the next room to find his sisters.

It was the same. I couldn’t believe this room was the same. Daddy’s sheet music was strewn on the floor, his stereo stood useless in the corner.

The gold lettering was faded. The letter ‘I’ was completely scratched away. I’d like to believe it was from age but I knew better.

Papa used to yell, “This isn’t about you!” to Daddy. “You’re so selfish.”

And Daddy would yell back. He tried to prove his point by destroying the one thing he loved most in the world.

We kids used sit on the staircase, listening. When once there was beautiful music, played by Daddy’s gentle hands, there was shouting, banging, crashing and, soon enough, crying.

I had gone to the door to listen after the loudest sounds dissipated. “I’m sorry,” I heard them say. “I’m so sorry.”

My sister and I snuck in to this room after one of their fights.

My sister was special. She was a genius in music. It was as if every instrument she laid her pretty little hands on came alive.

My sister couldn’t play our piano. Papa wouldn’t let her.

But when they were gone off to work or wherever, she and I would sneak in here and I’d lay my head on her shoulder and listen. Just listen to the songs she played. She favored the saddest songs. She had even composed a few. When Papa found them, he threw them in the fireplace.

The bench was just big enough for two. Three when we were kids.

But we grew bigger and the fights were louder. Papa was angry with him constantly. Daddy played even more, closing the door behind him and staying in here for what felt like lifetimes.

In the backroom, there was a piano. It was old and tired. It had seen too much. I dreamt that if I touched the keys, they’d scream out at me from the torment.

I dreamt about this piano often. Daddy smiling and playing. Papa singing along, even meowing playfully.

The strings were golden as if somehow blessed. ‘When was the last time someone stepped into this room?’ I thought to myself. It had to have been ages.

Had it been months? Years? Decades?

This piano had a history like my parents did. It was too turbulent to ask if they had ever really loved each other. Papa was always too tired and Daddy—Daddy only played piano.

‘When was the last time anyone touched this thing?’ I questioned again. I ran my fingers over the black keys, not pressing, just feeling. I wondered if it knew I was there–If he knew I was there after so many years.

We were so different, Daddy and I.

We never agreed on anything. He was a free spirit and I, his first born, was far too serious. I liked stability– still do. I liked quiet suburban nights and peaceful happy mornings. I liked grinning parents and constant electricity humming through the house. Daddy took that away from us every chance he got.

And Papa cried when he went away. Papa would tell him to leave when they fought. And they fought.

Their fights were about music, money and women and men and drugs and—and so many things that I couldn’t keep up. Their fights were explicit.

Afterwards, Daddy would smoke. Daddy would run away.

And Papa cried.

In the backroom, there was a piano. It was his piano. I knew that much because he’d shout it when Papa told him to get a real job, take care of the kids, get off his arse and help… “I can’t do this alone,” he’d say.

But Daddy never knew ownership except for this godforsaken piano.

We weren’t his, my sister and I. We weren’t Papa’s either but we were so much more. We were extensions of him. Everything he felt, we felt. Every time he cried, we cried.

But Daddy…

We were so different, us girls. We were different colors, different ethnicities, and different backgrounds but somehow— somehow we ended up in this house together. This house with the three bedrooms upstairs, with one washroom and a running toilet. This house with the small kitchen and squeaky steps. This house with battered frayed rugs.

Our house was a palace, large enough to take all our baggage, emotions and fears. It had room for hopes, prayers and dreams. It had room for that damned piano.

In the backroom there was a piano. It once had life, just like him. It once was a part of this family, just like him.

Did it know that it had a family? Did it know that it was the not-so-proud father of a genius and a neurotic? Did it know that it killed my papa? Did this fucking piano know what it did to us?

There were kids on the playground who asked us if we had two fathers. It wasn’t hard to say no. We had Papa and a human manifestation of a nightmare with talent and ambition with little to no luck.

There were women in the grocery store who asked my papa if he was okay because of the black eye and the scratches on his face and hands. They’d look to my sister and I and shake their heads. We must have been a sight, so skinny and sad-looking.

But there were nights when the music was replaced by gasping and low sounds. My sister and I would giggle and pray for more nights like those; when the music stopped and the happiness started.

By morning, Papa would be singing in the kitchen and Daddy swaying him in his arms while Papa whined because ‘the eggs were burning’.

In the backroom there was a piano with shiny black varnished, covered in the fog of grime. Did Daddy ever shine like he wanted to?

We saw a show when we were younger, practically babies. I only remember bright lights and the smell of alcohol. I think it was a club.

Were we the fog that drowned his brilliance? Did we suffocate him?

Were we not cool enough to hang out with? Were we too real? Did we represent every dream that would be stolen from him, straight out of his brain, as if they hadn’t been his in the first place?

I remember the fridge being empty and our uniforms days overdue for a wash. There was no heat on in the winter. Papa worked two jobs.

Daddy came home Christmas morning higher than the stars he’d yet to reach.

He scared us sometimes. He’d ramble his intoxicated nonsense and throw things.

Sometimes he thought he could fly. Papa told him he couldn’t. “You’re a fucking liar,” Daddy screamed back.

I think that’s why they separated. Daddy never believed Papa loved him and Papa was tired of saving him every single time.

In the backroom there was a piano. It knew emotions. It conveyed happiness, sadness, confusion and anger.

And I slammed my fist on it; hard.

Punched every key.

Made a ruckus.

And I shouted.

And I cried.

Told it to go to hell… so Daddy could play it again.

He so loved his piano more than anything else in the world.

I laid my head on its cover, watching the sun’s beams dance across the room.

“Love, it’s time to go,” my husband said. “The realtor got the estimate. It’s ready to go on the market.”

“We can’t leave the piano here!” I screamed.

It won’t destroy another family. I won’t let it.

He helped me up, held me safe in his arms. He whispered soft words of condolence. He said it was okay to cry. It was okay that I missed him.

He was my daddy after all. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on tumblr  
> [dannihowell](https://danni-howell.tumblr.com/)


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